Music

Fifteen years ago Soho’s Berwick Street was the place to go to buy records. Today it’s in danger of becoming just another place to buy panini. According to statistics from the Entertainment Retailers Association, between 2004 and 2006 more than a quarter of all independent music stores in the UK closed down. The reasons are well documented: the dominance of supermarkets and high-street chains, rising rents and the irrepressible growth of music downloads. But could it be that reports of the record store’s demise are greatly exaggerated? The burgeoning popularity of vinyl among indie music fanatics has kick-started an incredible resurgence of the seven-inch format: an estimated 201,380 vinyl singles were sold in 2000; last year that number rose to 1,040,008. So could it be that London’s independent record shops are getting their groove back? We speak to five to find out.
Feature continues

Debbie Smith at Intoxica! Records

Intoxica! Records
’60s beat, soul, jazz
Kitted out like a Honolulu beach bar, Intoxica! on Portobello Road has been peddling rare records since 1994. Debbie Smith, DJ and former guitarist/bassist in Echobelly and Curve, works with owner Nick Brown; she deals mainly with internet and mail order. Her forecast for the future of record shops is mixed.

What impact has the internet had on your business?
‘We’re doing okay, but now that everyone’s a record dealer, it’s tough. All you need is a computer and you can go on to eBay or Gemm and get 100 per cent of the price for selling your record.’

What is the future for independent record shops?
‘Struggle, trial and tribulation! It’s the rent. Inexplicably, vinyl is getting a lot more popular so there will always be a place for your bricks-and-mortar shop. But it will never be what it used to be.’

Why do you think the vinyl format is making a comeback?
‘Partly it’s fashion, but also the sound you get is so much warmer. It’s not a clean and clipped digital sound. It’s fuller and every record, even if scratched, tells its own story.’

Best buys ‘Boom’, The Sonics, LP, £10; ‘Karate’, The Emperors, seven-inch, £5.

Intoxica! Records, 231 Portobello Rd, W11 (020 7229 8010/www.intoxica.co.uk) Ladbroke Grove tube. Open Mon-Fri 10.30am-6.30pm, Sat 10am-6.30pm.

Tim Derbyshire at On the Beat

On the Beat
Soul, funk, reggae, ’60s beat or ‘post-war pop’
Tim Derbyshire has been working at Hanway Street’s On the Beat as a sales assistant, on and off, since its inception in 1979. The shop is the complete antithesis of a chain such as HMV or Zavvi: cluttered, musty and stacked with undiscovered gems.

What do you sell here?
‘Anything secondhand that’s in demand, basically. Old jazz through to rare hip hop. CDs and posters: it’s all here.’

How has the evolution of digital music affected your trade?
‘It’s increased it. There aren’t many record shops left in London now and lots of our customers say they are fed up with the internet.’

Why do you think your shop is still standing when so many others have closed?
‘My fantastic looks and personality perhaps? Karma, fate, maybe luck? I don’t know, but you have to have a sense of humour about these things otherwise you will drive yourself mad.’

Best buys ‘Bust Out’, The Busters, seven-inch, £25; classic Elvis Presley EP (one of his first ever), £120.

On the Beat, 22 Hanway St, W1 (020 7637 8934) Tottenham Court Rd tube. Open Mon-Sat 11am-7pm.

Tim Winter at Harold Moore's

Harold Moore’s
Classical
Stepping into Harold Moore’s on Great Marlborough Street is like stepping into a time warp. The shop sells predominantly classical music and its tenets of providing good music and even better customer service remain as robust as when it first opened 30 years ago. Tim Winter works there as a shop assistant.

How has the internet affected your business?
‘Not too badly. Obviously because we sell mostly classical, our demographic tends to be people who are not terribly comfortable with it. Also, for classical music, the sound quality of downloads really isn’t good enough.’

Does classical music-buying differ from rock or pop?
‘Yes, because with something like Beethoven’s Fifth you have a hundred and something recordings to choose from, whereas you only have two Arctic Monkeys albums. It worries people that they don’t think they know enough. But you are talking about nearly 1,000 years’ worth of music.’

This shop has been going for three decades. What’s the future?
‘The rent hike was going to kill us off but one of our regular customers (a nice Brummie engineer) recently came in and said if he could buy this shop he would. We told him it was up for sale and he bought it. We’re okay for the foreseeable future. We might even get new carpets!’

Best buys ‘The Soadie Waste’, James Dillon, £14.99.

Harold Moore’s, 2 Great Marlborough St, W1 (020 7437 1576/www.hmrecords.co.uk) Oxford Circus tube. Open Mon-Sat 10am-6.30pm, Sun 12noon-6pm.

Sounds of the Universe
Dubstep, jazz
Home of the cult label Soul Jazz, Soho’s Sounds of the Universe is an independent record shop success story. It has a website that complements its in-store trade and a regular clientele of trendy, money-spending musos. Nicole McKenzie works as a shop assistant.

What are your thoughts on the internet and where it’s taken your business?
‘Well, we have had our website up for two years now and having it has only made us stronger.’

Does having your own label help keep you afloat?
‘Yeah, definitely – eBay doesn’t affect us as much as it would a completely secondhand store because we’ve got our own label, we make brand-new music and we sell it on our site.’

What about downloads?
‘Any decent human would play vinyl, especially with dubstep [one of the genres Soul Jazz has moved into]. You can download all you want but no one is going to book you to play a dubstep rave with CDs. It’s all about those big, bass sounds that you can’t get off MP3s or CDs.’

Best buys ‘Shake Out Your Demons’, Digital Mystikz, 12-inch, £6.99; ‘An England Story’, Soul Jazz compilation, £9.99.

Sounds of the Universe, 7 Broadwick St, W1 (020 7734 3430/www.soundsoftheuniverse.com) Tottenham Court Rd tube. Open Mon-Sat 11.30am-7.30pm.

Duncan Kerr at Revival Records

Revival Records
Anything from rare rock vinyl to classic drum ’n’ bass
Duncan Kerr, general manager of Revival Records, was involved with Reckless Records for 23 years until all four of its sites closed last year. When the company went bust, Revival bought up some of Reckless’s old stock and opened on the location of the mini-chain’s former dance music branch in Soho’s Berwick Street last February.

How would you describe your business? What’s your niche?
‘It’s hard to find a niche these days. It’s very hard to sell CDs, DVDs, anything digital at a reasonable price because everything is so cheap on the high street or online. We’ve currently got a good range of original Mo’ Wax and Blue Note vinyl.’

What has had the greatest impact on your business?
‘Digital technology. The compact disc spelt the death of vinyl and within years it led to people being able to download and upload CDs and DVDs.’

Is what happened on Berwick Street an indication of what’s to come for the industry?
‘We’ve lost half the shops around this area: Mister CD, Mr Bong, XSF, Daddy Cool… As a secondhand shop, we’ll keep plugging away with fewer staff and more cautious buying.’

Best buys ‘My Generation’, The Who, original seven-inch, £120; ‘Search for the New Land’, Lee Morgan, LP, £15.

Revival, 30 Berwick St, W1 (020 7437 4271) Oxford Circus tube. Open Mon-Sat 10am-7pm.